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ooks like the Midwest-domiciled Watcher of Weasels has de-iced enough to tabulate the votes in this week’s Watcher’s Council Quest for the Holy Flail, wherein bloggers of note push themselves mercilessly to achieve brilliance on the topics du jour.

Coming in first on the Council side of things … well, let me just turn it over to the Watcher, who wrote up a pretty good little summary of the winning entry from Mere Rhetoric, NJDC Tool Aaron Keyak Helpfully Illustrates How Liberal Activists Sneeringly Cocoon Themselves In Asinine Arguments And Dishonest Smears:

We all know that the terms “Huffington Post” and “Intellectually Dishonest” are synonymous but that particular lib playground never seems to disappoint when looking for ways to lower the bar on journalistic integrity let alone a contextual presentation of the facts. Thus NJDC Press Secretary Aaron Keyak’s hit piece usher’s in a new era of self aggrandizing bile that rivals even the most devoid collection of pseudo-intellects that regularly appear in that corner of the internet.

Coming in tied a third of a point behind were me – after two weeks in a row of being skunked out! – with my answer to a Lib reader who asked me what we “won” in Iraq, What, Indeed, Did We Win? and a really good piece from The Provocateur, The Shadow Government of the Obama Administration, about the amazing number of czars and advisors at the pinnacle of the Obama power, none of whom received Congressional review and approval.

On the non-Council side, the run-away winner was Spiked Online’s After Gaza: what’s behind 21st-century anti-Semitism?, a lengthy look at this blight on human behavior that continues to grow and spread.

For all the winners and a nice little introductory essay, check out the Watcher’s site.

I know you like that cold weather, Watcher, but did I mention I’m wearing a short-sleeved shirt today? Whatever.  Thanks for bundling up and doing a fantastic job with the weekly Flail.

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I’

ve been chain-meeting today, so this is my first chance to get over to the Watcher of Weasels and check out his week’s goodies. As any of you WoW fans know, the Watcher now puts some mighty good posts up on the site, like this:

On Saturday morning, the list of subpoenas served by the U.S. Attorney’s office in the Governor Rod Blagojevich case was made public. The list included one major surprise for the new administration.

A veritable “who’s who” of Obama staffers, surrogates and affiliates were among those whose communications with Blago were served with subpoenas. Put simply, within one week of President Barack Obama’s administration taking office, it is already under significant legal scrutiny that will — at a minimum — take precious time away from dealing with the country’s monumental economic and foreign policy challenges.

And, once again, the mainstream media is AWOL, unwilling to report on this very newsworthy story.

To read what follows that compelling intro, you’ll have to go to the site, where you can also find this week’s entries into the Watcher’s weekly Fair of Fairly Renaissance Thinking.  But I’m blood-oathed-bound to post them here as well, but Internet Explorer isn’t letting me copy them for some reason … probably the same reason why I use Mozilla … so please check out the entries at WoW.

And while you’re there, check out the Watcher of Weasels Facebook page. 

Council members will vote Thursday evening and you’ll see the results here Friday morning.

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“I

’d call [Maureen] Dowd an ass,” writes the Watcher of Weasels in the intro for the first Watcher’s Council competition of the Obama era, “but I am short on compliments today.”

Dowd, as you can well imagine, was reveling in the last thrills of Bush Derangement Syndrome – but I say, “Mr. President, now that you’re back in Texas, relax, have a sweet tea, and enjoy some fine reading … including this, from The Watcher:”

As I wrote yesterday in my Do You Feel Different? piece, there is plenty of Bush Derangement Syndrome to go around. The world is full of media types and political pundits that feel the nee to cajole and take pot shots at the former administration at least one last time. Which leads me to believe there is going to be a big void left in their already empty lives until the reality of President Barack Obama catches up with the myth that they have created.

Yes, you say, but what about this week’s entries? Glad you asked:

Council Submissions

• Joshuapundit - Israel Capitulates
• Rhymes With Right - And Where Does He Get His Life Back?
• The Glittering Eye - Fallacy of Composition
• Bookworm Room - Seeds of Destruction
• Mere Rhetoric - I’m Going To Miss Westminster Abbey – Britain Hands Itself Over To Radical Islam, Blames Israel
• The Colossus of Rhodey - The entertainment of moral ambiguity
• Bookworm Room - The Inspirational President
• Soccer Dad - Teaching Thomas
• Cheat-Seeking Missiles - U.N. Complicity Behind Shelling of its Compound
• Right Truth - Obama, he’s only human
• The Provocateur - The Insider Story of ACORN

Non-Council Submissions

• Submitted By: Joshuapundit – Robert Avrech/Big Hollywood - The Real Battle Of Algiers, Part 2
• Submitted By: Soccer Dad – Daled Amos/strong> - Did Monty Python Negotiate Israel’s Ceasefire?
• Submitted By: Rhymes With Right – NewsBusters - AP Describes Black Minister’s Mockery of Whites as Not Right As ‘Note of Racial Caution’
• Submitted By: The Glittering Eye – Pajamas Media - We Have Overcome Today
• Submitted By: Bookworm Room – Badger Blogger - A call to action for Wisconsin conservatives
• Submitted By: Mere Rhetoric – Middle East Forum - Syria Can’t Be Flipped
• Submitted By: The Colossus of Rhodey – BookForum.com - Onward and Downward
• Submitted By: Bookworm Room – Jeff Jacoby’s Pundicity - Questions for Obama’s science guy
• Submitted By: Cheat-Seeking Missiles – Armed and Dangerous - Gramscian Damage
• Submitted By: Right Truth – African Crisis - Zimbabwe: Mugabe accuses the Whites of trying to Foment unrest – Campaign to Intimidate & arrest the last few Whites
• Submitted By: The Provocateur – Washington Post - Voting Rights Anachronism

As usual, Council members will submit their votes Thursday evening and the Watcher will post the results Friday morning.

Thanks, Watcher.  You beware of aliens now, you hear?

Art: Riding the Fence by Jerry McElroy

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eing a consummate politician is hardly rare, but being one with an electrifying personality is, so with credit to his presence, Barack Hussein Obama will assume the most powerful mantle in the known universe from George W. Bush today – and I suppose I wish him well. At least a little.

I certainly wishes he survives his presidency.  Around the world, people who know even less about Obama than we do are thrilled to see what America has accomplished in electing someone black, young, exciting … and not Bush.  There is an opportunity for Obama to do well with that, to increase America’s credibility.  Lord knows, we have more than enough power; it’s credibility we’ve been running short of lately, in large part because the left and the media have made it so hard for Bush.

Obama will be excused from that scrutiny, so when he wants to follow something like Bush policy overseas, he will be able to get away with it, and in that I wish him well.

That’s about it.  On everything else, Obama’s doing well is a nightmare.

If he does well with his economic  policy, he will expand the federal government, raise taxes and impose new entitlements that will forestall recovery, cripple our motivation and immerse us nostrils-deep in debt.

If he does well politically, the GOP will flounder and will lose again in the 2010 mid-terms and in the 2012 presidentials will get no closer to the White House and see more slippage in Congress.

If he does well with his domestic policy, generations of Americans to follow will hold him and his vision of big government high, and a 58 year-old like me may not see a return to sane fiscal policy and small (even smallish) government in my lifetime.

If he does well on military policy, the forces of jihad will have time to heal their wounds and rebuild their networks, we will wound and not continue to build our military and intelligence resources, and the war against suicidal fanatical Islam will last longer than it needs to.

If he does well internationally, the U.N. will continue to build up repressive regimes, will remain powerless in the face of genocides it can’t quite bring itself to call genocides, and will squander far too much money and deliver far too little aid.

If he does well personally, he will be influential for decades to come and ultimately, we will be carving another face into Mt. Rushmore, which means, as I said above, our country will take a long, long time to come back from the social democratic brink, if it can, if it does.

So, God bless America for being an open democracy where Barack Hussein Obama can become president without a blood coup, and God bless Barack Hussein Obama and grant him a long life, a natural death, and most importantly, wisdom.

Because if he doesn’t get some wisdom sometime soon, I just can’t wish him well.

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It’s a bit  before 7 a.m. and the thermometer in the back yard reads 61 degrees, as a typically Southern Californian high pressure barricade pushes the real weather off to the north – but I’m not buying any anthropogenic global warming explanation because the poor Watcher of Weasels posted this week’s blog entries despite this:

For the second day in a row I got up at 4:30 in the morning to plow the snow out of my driveway. Yesterday morning I had about 6 inches worth of heavy powder and it was a real bear. The temperature was 9° and a wind chill at minus 12°. Whoa, that’s cold!

This morning we had a repeat performance with a little added gusting. Approximately 4 inches was added to the snow that was already on my plot and the wind was making it insufferable. I cleared a small area because it was still snowing and it quickly filled back in. We expect 6 more inches this morning.

Sounds like perfect weather to stay home with a big pot of tea and some good reading.  I can provide the latter:

Council Submissions

• The Glittering Eye - Wealth
• The Colossus of Rhodey - ABC’s ‘Ugly Americans’: Obnoxious George Bush Supporters
• Mere Rhetoric - Media Outlets Can’t Get Over The Tactical Brilliance Of Hamas’s Use Of Human Shields
• The Provocateur - Some Perspective on the Great Loan Modification Scam
• Bookworm Room - Looking for Insults
• Right Truth - America Said NO
• Soccer Dad - Both sides now
• Rhymes With Right - Representation By The Numbers
• Cheat-Seeking Missiles - As BHO Channels FDR, Worries Grow
• The Razor - Three Shocks For New Doctors
• Joshuapundit - The Hidden Story On Gaza

Non-Council Submissions

• Submitted By: The Glittering Eye – Kenneth Anderson’s Law of War and Just War Theory Blog - The NYT and the information theory of the leisure class, Part 1 of 4
• Submitted By: The Colossus of Rhodey – World Affairs Journal - Paved Intentions: Civilization and Imperialism
• Submitted By: Mere Rhetoric – Yaacov Lozowick’s Ruminations - Waging War the Israeli Way
• Submitted By: The Provocateur – Townhall - There is a Better Stimulus Out There
• Submitted By: Bookworm Room – FrontPage Magazine - Hamas’ Brutal Legacy
• Submitted By: Right Truth – BlogBat - France TV Using Old Pix to Impugn Current Israeli Ops
• Submitted By: Soccer Dad – Yourish - There’s a kind of hate all over the world
• Submitted By: Rhymes With Right – Jewish Odysseus - GERMAN “POLICE” JOIN JEW-HATING MUSLIM MOB
• Submitted By: Cheat-Seeking Missiles – Freedom - Israel vs. Hamas – A Gedera Resident’s Perspective
• Submitted By: The Razor – A Big Victory - Anger Direct Management
• Submitted By: Joshuapundit – Robert Avrech/Big Hollywood - Learning From the Real Battle of Algiers

As usual, the Watcher’s Council will read this hearty fare and submit their votes for the best posts on Thursday night.  The Watcher will post the results Friday morning.  Thanks, Watcher, for putting together this week’s heartwarming competition. Now you bundle up, you hear?

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s you can imagine given the pro-Israel viewpoints of the Watcher’s Council – and the fact that Israel is the primary topic for one of our members – this was a week of great insight into middle eastern affairs at the Watcher of Weasel‘s weekly thought bazaar.  And despite the fine job Watcher did at laying out his wares, the Council ended up buying an odd piece in the back row of his little shop.

Winning among the Council entries was a piece that had nothing to do with the current war in the middle east, rather, The Razor wrote of doctors, supply and demand in ‘Physician Shortage’ and the Free Market, which the Watcher introduces saying:

Please read it as you consider that Democrats are seeking to”change” the heath care industry in the United States. Now I am all for change but the government is not the answer here, at least not in the form of socialized medicine. The Razor discusses the tremendous costs for Primary Care physicians and the limited potential for reimbursement due to various logistical and government induced reasons.

Israel/Hamas followed, first with a humorous note with Joshuapundit’s It’s Hard Out There For A ( Hamas) Pimp, which keyed off the Hamas excuse that its weapons smuggling tunnels are also used for milk, food and goats.  BTW, I heard a wonk the other day note that after seeing film of the massive explosions that followed the bombing of the tunnels, he concluded that Hamas must have some highly explosive goats.

My piece on the dead Hamas leader Rayyan, Portrait of an Arse as a Dead Man, came in third.

On the non-Council side, Ron Rosenbaum’s piece, Some differences between Hamas and the Nazi Party, won handily.  Its charm is that as it found comparisons between the two, Rosenbaum was always able to show that Hamas was, in fact, worse that the Nazis.

For those of you who would like to be able to explain disproportionality with the benefit of the rules and regs that supposedly govern it, I recommend the third-place piece by Michael Totten, Gaza and the Law of Armed Conflict. And if you’re up for a little dread and fear (AKA, a head’s up), give a look at the piece that tied it for third, A Warning for America from South Africa.  I disagree with the piece overall, but there were still numerous points that gave me pause.

For all the wares at Watcher’s bazaar of ideas, click here.  Thanks, Watcher.  But 20 sheckles for this?  You must be mad!  Five at the most!

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he Watcher of Weasels has caught up from his very busy this morning doing non-Watcher business (What?  Weasel-watching isn’t job enough to keep food on the table?), and has up all the entries in this week’s quest for the best in the blogosphere.

Council Submissions

• Joshuapundit - It’s Hard Out There For A ( Hamas) Pimp
• Rhymes With Right - On The Conflict Against Hamas
• Bookworm Room - Taking Reagan’s Name in Vain
• The Glittering Eye - Money for the States?
• Cheat-Seeking Missiles - Portrait of an Arse as a Dead Man
• Soccer Dad - Nyt: hamas upgrades = success / israel defends = disaster
• The Razor - ‘Physician Shortage’ and the Free Market
• Right Truth - It’s a Terrifying World
• Mere Rhetoric - Concise List Of Middle East Failures That Were Going To Happen Anyway But That Foreign Policy Experts Will Now Blame On Israel
• The Colossus of Rhodey - Dopey WNJ Letter of the Week
• The Provocateur - Jews, Israel and the Democratic Party

Non-Council Submissions

• Submitted By: Joshuapundit – Natan Sharansky/WSJ - “HOW THE U.N. PERPETUATES THE ‘REFUGEE’ PROBLEM”
• Submitted By: Rhymes With Right – Debbie Schlussel - Schlissels of Israel Report: HAMAS Missile Missed Us By That Much; My Cousins’ School Hit
• Submitted By: Bookworm Room – Ron Rosenbaum.com/Pajamas Media - Some differences between Hamas and the Nazi Party
• Submitted By: The Glittering Eye – Michelle Malkin - Who says conservative bloggers don’t do reporting?
• Submitted By: Cheat-Seeking Missiles – Commentary - Gaza and the Law of Armed Conflict
• Submitted By: Soccer Dad – Daled Amos - Surge: Israeli Style
• Submitted By: The Razor – The AnarchAngel - The Most Basic of Differing First Principles
• Submitted By: Right Truth – Middle America News - A Warning for America from South Africa
• Submitted By: Mere Rhetoric – The Terror Wonk - Managing Gaza
• Submitted By: The Colossus of Rhodey – The New Criterion - Introduction: The dictatorship of relativism

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I

t takes more than a little Auld Lang Syne to keep the Watcher of Weasels from his appointed rounds, and true to form, he posted this week’s Watcher’s Council quest for the best of the blogosphere right on schedule. We’re starting the year with some good stuff – pretty much my selections, which is reaffirming in a week when good ol’ C-SM bombed out.

Winning among the Council entries was Joshuapundit’s Gaza:A Tale Of Selective Morality and Tribal Warfare, the pick o’ the litter of a bunch of great analyses of the latest Israel/Hamas confrontation, followed by The Razor’s Walking In Israel’s Shoes, which does some pretty nifty stuff with maps to make you feel what israelis feel when Hamas fires off rockets.

I picked Razor for third, and Bookworm for second.  Her Hamas’ “Heroes” — and the need for total victory over evil also does a nifty job of putting the conflict in real-feel terms.

On the non-Council side, the results reflected my votes. David Keyes came in first with his post from Commentary, Sderot under Seige, which takes us into the bulls-eye of Hamas’ targeting and elsewhere around Israel and Gaza to help us to understand what’s going on there. Coming in second was Melanie Phillips writing in The Guardian, Groundhog day for the fifth column of malice, highlighting the role of the media in perpetrating Hamas’ insanity.

Read all the winners here. Thanks, Watcher, for good work under holiday pressure. Uh … you can take the lampshade off your head now.

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ut with the old, in with the new … and read some really good stuff in the process.  The Watcher of Weasels has posted this week’s entries into the best o’ the blogs competition – a real marathon this time, starting in 2008 and not ending until 2009.

The entries cover some pretty monumental topics, but as  you read them consider the list of what happened on this date, Dec. 31, over the years, as posted by the Watcher, including these highlights:  The end of WWII (1946), Yasser Arafat’s first terrorist raid on Israel (1964) and, for those of you who are thinkin’ about drinkin’ tonight, the introduction of the “drunk-o-meter” breathalyzer in 1938.

Council Submissions

• The Provocateur - A Liberal’s View of Patriotism
• Joshuapundit - Gaza:A Tale Of Selective Morality and Tribal Warfare
• Cheat-Seeking Missiles - The Most Ridiculous Story of the Year – Part 7
• The Glittering Eye - Trust
• Bookworm Room - Hamas’ “Heroes” — and the need for total victory over evil
• Right Truth - WANTED: Politician to Represent Me
• The Colossus of Rhodey - The bar has been lowered SOOO far …
• Soccer Dad - Talkin’ turki
• The Razor - Walking In Israel’s Shoes
• Mere Rhetoric - Anti-Israel Partisans Set New Record For Decades-Old Trick Of Brazenly Rewriting History, Blaming Israel
• Rhymes With Right - What It’s All About

Non-Council Submissions

• Submitted By: The Provocateur – Forbes - A Nation of Wussies
• Submitted By: Joshuapundit – David Keyes/Commentary - Sderot under Seige
• Submitted By: Cheat-Seeking Missiles – Belmont Club - The People of the Shadows
• Submitted By: The Glittering Eye – Sippican Cottage - The Greater Fool Theory of Housing
• Submitted By: Bookworm Room – Melanie Phillips - Groundhog day for the fifth column of malice
• Submitted By: Right Truth – Front Page Magazine - A Caliphate ‘From the Red Sea to the Caspian’?
• Submitted By: The Colossus of Rhodey – Daled Amos - Notes on Today’s Conference Call on Gaza
• Submitted By: Soccer Dad – Yourish - Talkin’ Turki Part two
• Submitted By: The Razor – Weasel Zippers - Assorted Articles on Gaza Attacks
• Submitted By: Mere Rhetoric – Counterterrorism Blog - Jihad by the Shoe: Who Was Behind it and why?
• Submitted By: Rhymes With Right – The Anchoress - Workouts: Bush creepy; Obama a godling

Watcher’s Council members will submit their votes tomorrow evening, and you’ll find the results here Friday morning. Thanks, Watcher, for not spilling spiked eggnog all over the entries.

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ifty-eight December twenty-sixes this body has seen, but only fifty-seven December twenty-fifths … why, It’s my birthday!  But the Watcher’s Council put no birthday presents this year under my birthday tree – and yes, I have a birthday tree.  Eat your hearts out.

I got just a third of a vote for my piece on Rick Warren and the gays, but fair’s fair:  The other pieces were better.

Winning the competition this week was my vote for first, The Razor’s The Symbol of Oppression, a history of the peace symbol:

The roots of this symbol are soaked in the blood of innocents. The group credited for popularizing the symbol, a stylized combination of the semaphore signals for ‘N’ and ‘D’ (for nuclear disarmament), is the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament (CND). The CND was founded in 1958 by supporters of the Soviet Union including a spy for the East German Stasi, Vic Allen, and Michael Foote, later accused by KGB defector Oleg Gordievsky as being a KGB spy (Foote challenged the claim in UK court as libel and won.) Another member of the CND Granny Melita Norwood was the KGB’s top spy in the UK, passing secrets to them until she was arrested in 1999 at the age of 87 . She died unrepetant and free in 2005. The Mirror wrote at the time “she never regretted her betrayal and was committed to the Soviet cause and to ‘peace and socialism’ up to her death.” In 1982 Deputy CIA Director John McMahon testified before Congress that the Soviet Union had provided $100,000,000 to anti-nuclear groups including the CND.

There’s much more to this fascinating piece, and any student of recent history should read it all.

There was a tie for second among two entries I thought worthy of winning, Joshuapundit’s appreciation of Dick Cheney, Cheney Slaps Biden Upside The Head and Mere Rhetoric’s Smug Liberal Sophistication Undisturbed By Decades Of Disastrously Wrong Domestic And International Predictions.

On the Non-Council side, John Stossel’s Arrogance and Conceit Won’t Fix the Economy came in first, followed by Larrey Anderson’s American Thinker piece Climate Crisis = Logic Crisis and Dhimmi Watch’s Fitzgerald: If we cut off the jizya, could things become even worse?
See all the winners at Watcher of Weasels. Thanks, Watcher, for taking care of all this on Christmas and my birthday – an extra cup of eggnog for you!

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